This is How I Prevent My Writing Well from Drying

There’s a well I want to dig deep into. Every time I try to dig deep into it, it seems I’m falling short. The flowing water makes it difficult for me to dig.

Of course, I know I’ll have to remove the water therein to have access. But the more water I draw out, the more the fountain produces.

But even as I try, the ground is too hard to dig further despite the water inside.

If there’s water in the ground and you want to dig further down, won’t it be much easier because the ground is already soft?

That’s different with me now. I want to dig deep, but the ground is hard.

I Didn’t Choose Writing; Writing Chose Me

Did I make a mistake in choosing the creative path? But I didn’t choose to be creative, creativity chose me. Did I make a mistake by calling myself a writer?

I never called myself a writer. Writing makes me a writer and then people see my writings and call me a writer.

I would love to keep creating. But the burden of writing is too heavy. I could then relapse into not creating. Sadly, heavier is the burden of not writing than that of writing.

Writing Runs in My Mind Always

At every point in time, my mind must be running with something it has chosen to call art. And every time that occurs, my hand must be working to translate the work into readable content.

If I don’t, the fountain will be discouraged. The source will sleep. And the well will dry.

But I never chose this life. It chose me. And now I must live by it, or else I would be considered a failure. People would boo and call me a starter who lacks finishing power.

Well, it isn’t much about what people would say as it is about what my mind says, the source and wellspring of my art. Even if people consider me a failure, it’s their take, not mine. As long as I know that I have tried, then I am not a failure.

But if my fountain calls me a failure, then by all means I have failed.

And that I must strive against, if possible, with drops of blood trickling from my pen. For what do I gain in life if my mind requires something good of me and I fail to achieve it?

My Writing Spring Is Unquenchable

The fount is trying to bless me with something to live for. An unstoppable spring that keeps pumping and springing.

Something I can refer to as an achievement. Something that makes me feel okay. Something that makes me feel fulfilled.

If for the sake of pleasure or pain, lack of resources or ill-heath, I defy my mind. If for the sake of dryness I reject the call of my mainspring to create, then I am of all the world the most wretched and my fountain will never forgive me for not trying.

But my mind wouldn’t permit me just to try alone. I must finish whatever it asks me to begin. I must stop my wellspring from running dry.

And that is the stage I’m at currently. In the belly of a well. In the midst of waters. On hard ground full of waters. On watered ground difficult to dig.

The thing is I must keep digging. I am my fountain’s labourer. I am my wellspring’s bricklayer.

If you know what the labourers do and feel what they go through, you will know it is not easy to obey my mind.

And that’s how I keep my well from drying. I keep digging.

It’s not so easy though. At times, the well is asking me for more than I can give. It is asking me to dig more than I can dig. And it doesn’t take no for an answer. I must always deliver.

It seems the life I have chosen is a life of constant call to make me uneasy and uncomfortable.

What am I even saying? I mean the life that has chosen me is a life of deliberate unease and discomfort. A life I cannot un-choose, or else, I would find my way out of it into freedom.

But in the unease, I find peace. It is amidst the unease I find fulfilment. So, why should I call something unease when I’ve found a purpose in it?

I shouldn’t be ungrateful to the wellspring that has decided to keep flowing for me.

Even though I have to go through some level of discomfort sometimes to get my writing done, it is what I love to do.

Sometimes, I have to run a sleepless night and forgo my night’s sleep so that I can create, still, it’s just a feeling of unease.

Creating something means that I have achieved something worthwhile with the time I spent creating it. In this, I believe every creative mind should find joy.

I Must Leave My Footprints Everywhere

Interestingly, the fountain keeps pushing me and there’s no saying ‘no’ to its compelling power.

It keeps reassuring me that I cannot pass my naked feet through the beach called earth without leaving footprints.

Of course, I know that I am not a stone.

I am not a stone that when dropped into a river, path closes immediately behind it, totally forgotten and erased without leaving a clue to anyone that it just passed by.

I also know that I am not a bullet.

I am not a bullet that with all its damaging power when shot out of the gun, leaves no trace in the air.

No matter how long it travels, it travels alone without a companion and without a footprint until it gets to its destination. And when it gets there, no one can say this is exactly the path it took to get there.

Instead, I am a naked foot on a soiled beach, walking and working, leaving prints everywhere I pass through.

I belong to the stock of the sun, which has consistency, and which has a daily journey to take without lagging in it.

I am an artist that causes my fountain to flow even when it doesn’t feel like flowing. I am an artist that digs a shallow well deep, though its floor is hard and unpassable.

Writing Is Not a Stressful Business

Art is not a stressful business; therefore, writing is not a stressful business. And when it does become stressful, because it sometimes does, we call it another name. We call it process.

Process is not a stressful journey. It’s curiosity. Curiosity endangers my fear of failure and causes me to seek a better way to achieve my work.

I’m curious to see the end of this thing I’ve started to create.

I’m curious to see people read my work and know that they’ve been blessed by it, whether they tell me or not.

I’m curious to see what my mind will tell me every time I complete a work of art.

I’m curious because my mind will not ask me to do something and live me to do it alone. The spring will always provide another way if I’m stuck.

I write not because it is the only way. I write because writing gives me the privilege to explore other possible ways which I didn’t know of, but that I will recognise as soon as I settle down to write.

And these are the conversations that help me stay continually alive and stop my writing fount from drying.

While the conversations occur, they warn me about the effect of a dried well. A lot of dirt would be allowed in it. Because there’s no water in it anymore, it takes something else. Dirt.

I Listen to the Voice of My Mind

And so, I have concluded that it is easier to keep writing than to keep gathering dirt.

And because I’m not disobedient to the voice of my mind, no matter how noisily the streams flow in, I must write. Because I always want to encourage the well and keep it from drying, I must write.

No matter how challenging the times become, even when I am not in the mood to write anything, I must at least scribble something down in my notepad.

It could be an idea that would later give birth to big content. Or it could just be a group of sentences that would remain forever in the memory of my notepad.

It doesn’t matter. As long as I write it down, I’ve been faithful to the voice of my mind and I am encouraging the well to keep springing more.   

If by any means they call you a writer and you’ve never had these conversations with yourself, please tell me, how did you escape it?

Epilogue

Do you have a similar experience while trying to complete a work of art or prevent your writing well from drying? Or are your methods different? Share it in the comment box below and let’s learn from you.